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Topic: Canadian Islamaphobia or Free Speech? (Read 207 times)

There was a rally on Friday to protect free speech. Free speech needed to be protected in front of a Toronto Mosque, with Muslims being told, via loudspeaker and banners, that they were terrorists, that Islam was hate and should be banned; they also attempted to stop people entering the Mosque. Police are considering whether or not the actions of the protesters are a hate crime, or part of free speech.

I think that they should be allowed to do what they did. That doesn't make it any less disgusting though.

I agree. Even if the police were to charge them with something, it would only give them a claim that they were 'discriminated against' in favor of "Muslims who are taking over Canada".

I looked at the group's FB page and they're all about protecting Jews from people who would harm them. Their statement of purpose includes the line - "Hatred is like cancer, the more you leave it untreated by ignoring it, the worse it gets ..." and yet they seem to think this is an effective strategy for accomplishing their goal.

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“Neither a man nor a crowd nor a nation can be trusted to act humanely or to think sanely under the influence of a great fear.” Bertrand Russell, Unpopular Essays

There was a rally on Friday to protect free speech. Free speech needed to be protected in front of a Toronto Mosque, with Muslims being told, via loudspeaker and banners, that they were terrorists, that Islam was hate and should be banned; they also attempted to stop people entering the Mosque. Police are considering whether or not the actions of the protesters are a hate crime, or part of free speech.

I do object to the idea of putting any sort of legal teeth behind it, however. I'd hate to see real discussion be suppressed, and I think legitimate media and politicians and legal authorities go out of their way to avoid any topic that might conceivably stir up controversy regarding Islam.

I do object to the idea of putting any sort of legal teeth behind it, however. I'd hate to see real discussion be suppressed, and I think legitimate media and politicians and legal authorities go out of their way to avoid any topic that might conceivably stir up controversy regarding Islam.

-k

And so far there is no attempt to put any legal teeth behind it. But a motion to recognize its existence isn't a bad idea. Lets not to be afraid to identify xenophobia.

I do object to the idea of putting any sort of legal teeth behind it, however. I'd hate to see real discussion be suppressed, and I think legitimate media and politicians and legal authorities go out of their way to avoid any topic that might conceivably stir up controversy regarding Islam.

-k

Maybe it's less about stirring up controversy and more about stirring up Islamaphobia?

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“Neither a man nor a crowd nor a nation can be trusted to act humanely or to think sanely under the influence of a great fear.” Bertrand Russell, Unpopular Essays

Maybe it's less about stirring up controversy and more about stirring up Islamaphobia?

I understand that credible news organizations feel a duty to tread lightly on hot-button issues, but there is also danger in steering too far the opposite direction.

One example: the New Years Eve debacle in Cologne. The police initially issued a glowing report about what a peaceful and well-behaved evening it had been. The mainstream media said nothing. But the story spread like wildfire on social media. Everybody in Cologne knew something had happened, and the only people talking about it were the "alt right" media. After several days of criticism for sitting on the story, the mainstream media started covering the story and issued apologies for not covering it sooner. Well, guess what... that makes the mainstream media and the police look untrustworthy.

There was a similar story out of Sweden, where the police were caught covering up sexual assaultsof teenage girls at a Stockholm music festival in 2014 and 2015. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_Are_Sthlm_sexual_assaults As at Cologne and other places, the victims were surrounded by groups of "recent immigrants" and molested. The police spokesman said that they decided to not make the incidents public because "it would just be fuel for the Social Democrats". The Social Democrats are Sweden's right-wing party and have campaigned that Sweden is taking in too many immigrants. Given the circumstances, maybe it would be fair to consider that the Social Democrats have a point? Regardless, once again this incident makes the police look untrustworthy. Given the circumstances, people had a right to know that girls were being molested at the music festival.

Another example, I recently saw a story involving a sexual assault by a Syrian refugee at a New Brunswick school. The story was covered by "The Rebel Media". They did their homework, obtained documents from school staff through FOI access requests, verified that there was a real incident, a real irate parent, and that the Syrian was punished with a one week suspension. http://www.therebel.media/exclusive_syrian_refugee_school_sex_attack

Now, personally I think Ezra Levant is a shit-head, and the Rebel Media is a scummy and slimy operation. But the thing is, nobody else is reporting on this sort of thing. Ezra claims his shitty website is the only news outfit in Canada with the balls to report on trouble involving the Syrian refugees, and unfortunately he's right. That kind of thing contributes to the growing mistrust of the mainstream media.

If I look at other media outlets, I can see happy human interest stories about the Syrian refugees. Syrian refugees attend their very first hockey game! Syrian refugees attend Rememberance Day ceremonies. Syrian refugees help family find lost dog! No story about Syrian refugees having problems integrating with highschool students. If you're only reporting positive news about something and ignoring the negative, isn't that called propaganda?

I understand that credible news organizations feel a duty to tread lightly on hot-button issues, but there is also danger in steering too far the opposite direction.

If I look at other media outlets, I can see happy human interest stories about the Syrian refugees. Syrian refugees attend their very first hockey game! Syrian refugees attend Rememberance Day ceremonies. Syrian refugees help family find lost dog! No story about Syrian refugees having problems integrating with highschool students. If you're only reporting positive news about something and ignoring the negative, isn't that called propaganda?

It's not much of a secret in Ottawa who commits the lions share of street crime. But you'll never read about it in the local papers or hear it mentioned on the news. If there are swarmings the criminals are described as 'youths', and when there are shootings the only time you'd get any idea of who was involved would be if there were deaths or arrests so the names or pictures get in the paper. There were a lot of street gang shootings last year. No media mentioned any suggestion, not even a hint, that there might be any sort of commonality among the people involved. Of course, if you kept track of the dead and those arrested or wanted for murder, you soon began to see a pattern.

Certainly the Ottawa police do, which is why the usual suspects are complaining that police are stopping more Black and Arab drivers than would be statistically proper, and our mayor is busily making the rounds of ethnic activists to assure them something will be done to ensure the police aren't racists.

The media see their role very paternalistically, like teachers ensuring their students don't see what they shouldn't see, or like parents who want their children to think the right things. They don't want people talking about all the ethnics involved in crime, and maybe wondering why that is and whether our immigration system is necessarily bringing in the right people. But now and then stuff gets out, even in the major media, either by mistake or by the design of someone bucking the trend. Like the recent posting of an Ottawa police wanted poster in the paper showing 22 out of 25 wanted people were non-white, most with obviously Muslim names. Or another article in the human interest section praising those working to fundraise for a Somali youth center and pointing out how strong the need is given more than half the youths in Ottawa's detention centre were Somalis. And of course, reading all those murder reports last year it was impossible not to notice how many Muslim names were involved.

But all the media will show us is smiling immigrants cheerily waving Canadian flags...

I understand that credible news organizations feel a duty to tread lightly on hot-button issues, but there is also danger in steering too far the opposite direction.

One example: the New Years Eve debacle in Cologne. The police initially issued a glowing report about what a peaceful and well-behaved evening it had been. The mainstream media said nothing. But the story spread like wildfire on social media. Everybody in Cologne knew something had happened, and the only people talking about it were the "alt right" media. After several days of criticism for sitting on the story, the mainstream media started covering the story and issued apologies for not covering it sooner. Well, guess what... that makes the mainstream media and the police look untrustworthy.

There was a similar story out of Sweden, where the police were caught covering up sexual assaultsof teenage girls at a Stockholm music festival in 2014 and 2015. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_Are_Sthlm_sexual_assaults As at Cologne and other places, the victims were surrounded by groups of "recent immigrants" and molested. The police spokesman said that they decided to not make the incidents public because "it would just be fuel for the Social Democrats". The Social Democrats are Sweden's right-wing party and have campaigned that Sweden is taking in too many immigrants. Given the circumstances, maybe it would be fair to consider that the Social Democrats have a point? Regardless, once again this incident makes the police look untrustworthy. Given the circumstances, people had a right to know that girls were being molested at the music festival.

Another example, I recently saw a story involving a sexual assault by a Syrian refugee at a New Brunswick school. The story was covered by "The Rebel Media". They did their homework, obtained documents from school staff through FOI access requests, verified that there was a real incident, a real irate parent, and that the Syrian was punished with a one week suspension. http://www.therebel.media/exclusive_syrian_refugee_school_sex_attack

Now, personally I think Ezra Levant is a shit-head, and the Rebel Media is a scummy and slimy operation. But the thing is, nobody else is reporting on this sort of thing. Ezra claims his shitty website is the only news outfit in Canada with the balls to report on trouble involving the Syrian refugees, and unfortunately he's right. That kind of thing contributes to the growing mistrust of the mainstream media.

If I look at other media outlets, I can see happy human interest stories about the Syrian refugees. Syrian refugees attend their very first hockey game! Syrian refugees attend Rememberance Day ceremonies. Syrian refugees help family find lost dog! No story about Syrian refugees having problems integrating with highschool students. If you're only reporting positive news about something and ignoring the negative, isn't that called propaganda?

-k

If I could add, unfortunately it adds credibility to the alt-right and trump for their war with "fake news". If it keeps being that one sided, then there's fuel to the fire with trumps war with the media.

I recently saw a story involving a sexual assault by a Syrian refugee at a New Brunswick school. The story was covered by "The Rebel Media". They did their homework, obtained documents from school staff through FOI access requests, verified that there was a real incident, a real irate parent, and that the Syrian was punished with a one week suspension

Now, personally I think Ezra Levant is a shit-head, and the Rebel Media is a scummy and slimy operation. But the thing is, nobody else is reporting on this sort of thing. Ezra claims his shitty website is the only news outfit in Canada with the balls to report on trouble involving the Syrian refugees, and unfortunately he's right. That kind of thing contributes to the growing mistrust of the mainstream media.

Yes, sexual assault is a big problem in society

Almost one in three girls in Grade 9 stated that “someone brushed up against me in a sexual way” or “someone touched, grabbed, or pinched me in a sexual way” 54% of Canadian girls under the age of 16 have experienced some form of unwanted sexual attention. 24% have experience rape or coercive sex and 17% have experienced incest

Nobody is reporting these cases, only Goldy/Levant who have an agenda and go out and find one not because it is representative of the problem as a whole but because they want to tar and feather one segment of the population. Instead of traveling to New Brunswick, they should look in their own back yard because there are good old white boys in Alberta doing the same thing.

So you don't feel there's any need for a discussion on whether it's appropriate for adult men to be put into the same school classes as adolescent girls, or whether a week suspension is an appropriate punishment for someone who stuffed his hand down a girls pants and squeezed her genitals?